My New Normal: In lockdown I’m reviving the unscheduled phone call

In the series My New Normal writers are telling us how their lives, routines and minds have changed during the coronavirus outbreak – and if they plan on keeping it up post-lockdown.

On Monday 23 March, hours before Boris Johnson announced stricter lockdown restrictions, my phone rang. I jumped. I wasn’t expecting a call. It was my old university friend, Andrew. I picked up the phone. “Hello,” he said. “Do you remember when this is what life was like? When you’d just call people?” I couldn’t.

I became scared of talking on the phone probably at a similar time as the WhatsApp group exploded onto the phone screen. I can’t believe that as a teenager, I’d just call a friend on a whim. By my thirties, I never called anyone and the sound of a ringing phone would cause me to panic. The phone call became for bad news or for when someone you’re meeting is lost.

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It was so freeing to have an unscheduled phone call with my friend Andrew that Monday, that I started calling other friends to ask how they were. I spoke to my friend Harry, who lives in a different city to me and who I hadn’t talked to in months.

Now, after I’ve finished work and before I start making dinner, I call people without scheduling it with them first. I have about three unscheduled phone calls a day. I usually start by calling my inner circle: my mum, my sister and my best friend and podcast co-host, Anna Codrea-Rado. I then call whoever else is on my mind that day.

By embracing the old-fashioned unscheduled phone call, I’m forging more meaningful connections with loved ones

While everyone is busy scheduling Zooms, trying to recreate the essence of life before lockdown, I see the unscheduled phone call as an opportunity to enjoy a slower pace of life. I find organising phone calls stressful and I don’t like being tied down by a scheduled call. There’s something impulsive, thoughtful and romantic even about picking up the phone and calling someone.

My unscheduled calls are also radical for our times because I prefer to talk over the actual phone, rather than over video. Admittedly, I’m spending my lockdown days looking like I’ve been dragged through a bush, so that’s partly why, but I also think there’s something special about the sound of a voice over the phone. The focus is purely on what each other is saying. Video calls are distracting —WiFi rarely works and if we’re honest, we probably spend most of the time on a video call looking at ourselves.

I love technology, and I’m so grateful that we have it now, but a one-on-one conversation with someone on the phone beats the mindless constant chatter of WhatsApp groups or the collective chaos of a group Zoom call. By embracing the old-fashioned unscheduled phone call, I’m forging more meaningful connections with loved ones.

I want to keep calling people after lockdown and I want people to call me, too. I don’t want us to go back to the busyness of our lives before, where we plan every moment, we’re always in a rush and we don’t leave space for spontaneity.

I still feel nervous when calling someone unscheduled for the first time. When they answer, I say; “Do you remember the time when we’d just call people?” They don’t. But they appreciate that I’ve called.

Read more from the series:
My New Normal